Dave Beeson runs away from his bike.

It’s not often that I give up a MTB race weekend to go running. Actually, it only happens once per year. But that’s what I did this last weekend. I missed out on the Wolf Mountain DH race to go run the Wasatch Back(Ragnar) with my wife and friends. Normally not a runner (and it shows), I prefer to ride, but every now and then it’s a good way to cross train. But I usually only do that during the winter months.

We started our 188.2 mile trek on Friday at about 5 pm, and ended Saturday at about 8:30 pm, so as you can tell it was a long event. It had many highlights, great views and good friends, and some lowlights, like blisters and lack of sleep (4 hours in 2 days). But the most important lesson that I learned is do not eat a sushi roll 1.5 hours before a long run. I tasted wasabe more times that I would have liked.

All in all, the Ragnar is a great event, it’s well run and planned to perfection by the organizers, and I would tell everyone that if you want to get a bunch of friends together and go do something fun that will challenge you and push you beyond your normal limits, then this is the event for you. I look forward to next year’s event when I can do it again.

Now I’m going for a ride on my bike, and maybe later I will get some sushi.